Camp Meeting Devotions - Day Twenty-Eight

 Psalm 85:6 (NASB)

⁶  Will You not Yourself revive us again, That Your people may rejoice in You?

The journey we live on this earth is filled with many plot twists, trials to overcome, and problems to solve. Followers of Jesus face these things like everyone else in addition to the constant spiritual assaults from our adversary. Demonic hounds nip at our heels night and day to trip us and keep us from progressing in our pilgrimage. 

Our affections for God can cool. Our zeal for service wane. Our passion gets diverted. We may still do all the spiritual disciplines required for maintaining a close relationship with God. We may pray, read our Bible, and attend worship. We may do these things and yet our hearts not be moved by them. We may check all the boxes of the things we are supposed to do and yet not be alive spiritually.

We need God to revive us. That means we need God to make us alive, to rekindle the flames of passion for Him and to nourish our souls with His presence. To be revived means to also be recovered, repaired, and restored. Like the hymn writer wrote, "Prone to wander Lord I feel it, prone to leave the God I love." In our wanderings we need God to find us and bring us back into His safe pasture. Like sheep we wander. We drift further and further from the Chief Shepherd. Believing the grass is greener on the other side of the fence we slip away. The Chief Shepherd does not ignore our wandering. He does not give up on us. He pursues us to recover and restore us to the fold. Whatever wounds we sustain in our wandering, Jesus repairs with the balm of His healing. 

We may drift so far from Jesus that we do not feel comfortable returning to Him out of shame and regret. We may feel He will be so disgusted with us that He will not receive us. That is what revival is. It is repenting, returning and Jesus restoring us. The gate to His pasture is open wide. He stands ever ready to receive the repentant. To restore us to the safety of His loving watch care. 

Rejoicing follows repentance and revival. True gladness, merry hearts, cheerful countenances, and exultation. God is the object of our rejoicing. He is the focal point of cheerfulness. Not in experiences but in encounters with Him that thrill the soul. Rejoicing that infects and infuses public worship. Exultation that fires service. Gladness that defies defeat in the harshest of circumstances. Joy in God should permeate the people of God. It is one sign that we are revived. Does that characterize our lives?

• Identify where you currently are in your relationship with God. Safely in the fold or wandering further away from Him. 
• In what ways do you need to be recovered, repaired and restored?
• Find reasons for rejoicing in God today.